"On rainy days, we lie silently in our rooms
When I face your closed eyes, everything becomes ours"
                                                                        - the black skirts




“Hello there, bunny,” he said, touching the birthmark above her knee.
“Idiot,” she chuckled. “Its Australia.”
“Australia is such a bad name for a bunny,” he said reproachfully.
“I asked you to come but you couldn’t make it for the naming ceremony,” saying so, she pushed his hand away.
Bobby laughed and leaned back on the headboard of her bed. The watery morning rays were filtering in through the leaves of the Yew Tree outside her window. The early breeze wafted in with a whiff of Yew and something woody. That fragrance would always remind him of her. She leaned back too and started to say something about her professor. He looked at her, watching the sunlight slant across her cheek, watching her black hair turn reddish in the ray and watched her pretty lips form words that he was not listening to at the moment. He leaned over, took her face in his hand and interrupted her with a light kiss.
“You know I love you, right?” he whispered.
Jisoo smiled and rubbed his nose affectionately. Pulling back, she resumed what she had been saying. Bobby wished that he didn’t wish so desperately for her to have said I love you too.

Love at first sight was a thing of the movies, but Bobby believed it happened to him. He had been scouting for an empty room to practice in for an upcoming University festival. Jisoo had been dancing alone in a room, her earpiece plugged in, and long, black hair swaying with her lithe body. Bobby remembered the black t-shirt she had been wearing and the way its wide neck had slipped surreptitiously down her shoulder. He had meant to walk away but he couldn’t remember why he had lingered. In the middle of a turn, she noticed him by the door. Bobby flushed and immediately began to apologize. She reached to remove her earpiece and to his surprise, she just chuckled.
“Do you need the practice room?” she asked.
“Oh no I was just gonna find another…” he fumbled.
“Its ok, I’m done for the day,” she said, giggling embarrassedly. “I know you’re one of the performers for the festival. I’m not really doing anything besides fooling around here.”
She began to walk over to her bag by the wall.
“That…,” Bobby began uncertainly, “…is ok…you dance well” He could have kicked himself for making it so awkward.
“Oh yeah?” she looked up at him with amused eyes and it struck him that she was very pretty. “Yeah,
 she continued, “I’m learning to Krump.”
Bobby didn’t know much about dancing but he didn’t think Krumping looked like that. Rather, he would have guessed she was dancing to a slow song.
As though to answer, she laughed again. “Yeah, that’s Jisoo’s style of Krumping.”  
He chuckled in response. He decided he liked her husky, carefree laugh.

 

 
“Hyung, Bobby’s in love,” Chan Woo yelled across the room at Han Bin, who, while trying to get a chord correct on the keyboard, ignored him.
“Who is it?” Jin Hwan asked instead, his face alit with interest. “Which department?”
“I don’t know anything,” Bobby replied. “Also, I never said I was in love. I just saw her and said she was pretty.” He aimed a smack at Chan Woo who dodged.
“Eii, don’t be shy,” Jin Hwan nudged him. “Hyung understands.”
Bobby rolled his eyes.
“Her name’s Jisoo,” Chan Woo told Jin Hwan and dodged another blow from Bobby before Han Bin clapped for the team to begin with practice.
 

“She’s from the Korean Literature Department,” Jin Hwan said in greeting the next day when they gathered for practice.
“What?” Bobby looked up bemused from the crackers he had been sharing with Han Bin.
“Long, black hair, small face, thick, husky voice and kinda flippant, correct?” Jin Hwan counted off his fingers.
“Hyung, you know her?” Bobby asked in surprise.
“So it’s the right one,” said Jin Hwan, looking rather satisfied.
“Did you go all weird stalking for a Jisoo all over the University?” Bobby demanded.
“No, you idiot,” Jin Hwan waved his hand in an irritated motion. “She’s Jimin’s hoobae from the same department. I met her once when she wanted to get some notes from Jimin.”
Bobby eyed him suspiciously. “Are you sure it was that?”
Jin Hwan looked at Bobby in disbelief. “What do you think of me? Why would I go around tracking down a random stranger all over the University just to help you at night?”
Bobby threw a cracker at him. “Aish, hyung, really…”
Jin Hwan picked the cracker off his lap and popped it in his mouth. “I can arrange a meeting for you if you want,” he offered. “It won’t be obvious. Like a group thing, you know.”

“No way,” Bobby scoffed. “I’m not desperate either. Besides, she’d think I stalked her.”
Jin Hwan shrugged. “As you wish.”
A week later, Jin Hwan received a late-night call from Bobby asking if the offer was still valid.    

Jisoo would always taunt him about the first group date they had. How he had sat rigidly opposite her friend Jennie, never daring to look up neither at Jennie nor at her. The first sentence he spoke after the customary introduction was “I wish the food arrived soon.”
Jin Hwan didn’t leave him alone about it either. “What kind of an idiot talks about food at that moment?”
In Bobby’s defence, Jisoo wearing a red dress had disarmed him.
“So corny,” Jisoo would laugh later. However, Jisoo always wore red if they had something special to celebrate.

But most importantly, Jisoo had given him her number by the end of it; thanks to Jin Hwan who lied that Jimin was having an upset stomach and nudged JunHoe to take Jennie home. As planned, Jin Hwan and Jimin left early while Jun Hoe pretended that he had to meet a cousin who stayed near Jennie’s dorm, thus leaving Bobby to walk Jisoo back to her place.
They spent the first few minutes in silence, neither of them looking at each other’s way. It was a warm Spring evening and Bobby toyed with the idea of talking about the weather but couldn’t find a way of saying it without sounding lame.
“Do you like streetlamps?” Jisoo finally asked when they were passing underneath one.
“Uh yeah, they remind me of certain songs,” Bobby replied.
“Which kind?”
“The Black Skirts kind.”
“I love The Black Skirts,” Jisoo gushed, accentuating the “love”. “That song ‘Everything’ is everything.”
Bobby smiled, his fingers curling in his fist in happiness.
They both instinctively looked up at the street lamps, each imagining the song.
In the distance, cicadas cried away into the night.
“What about you?” Bobby asked. “Do you like street lamps?”
“Yeah,” she replied. “They remind me of rainy days.”
“How come?”
“It’s a childhood memory,” she sighed wistfully. “My window overlooked a street with a lamp that flickered on rainy days. I loved the way the street lamp came to life every time the rain fell.”

Months later, lying on her bed on a rainy day, wrapped in her blankets and her fruity-shampooed-hair pressed against his face, the story took a different turn.
“I could hear him hitting her, even though the maid was trying to distract me,” she said and Bobby pulled her closer. “He was trying to drive away in the car. My older sister ran after him, jumped in the back and attacked him until the car drove straight into the lamp post.”
Bobby kissed the back of her head.
“The police came. He had been drinking as well. And my mother’s bruises coupled with me crying my head off... they took him away and a restraining order was placed on him. Every time the lamp came alive on rainy days, I thanked it for taking him away.” 
He wanted to say don’t worry, I got you now, but they sounded like empty words. Instead he wrapped his arms around her tighter and kissed her shoulder.
“Don’t worry, I’ll never be like that,” he said finally, despite himself. Jisoo turned her head to give him a weak smile. It made him want to protect her even more. “I love you,” he whispered into her hair. He wanted to replace all of her sad memories with his love, keep her safe from everything and fill her with him just like the way she filled his senses. “I love you so much,” he whispered again.
“I love you too,” Jisoo returned. He wished he didn’t wonder if she had simply been obliged to say it or if she had wanted to say it. He pushed the thought out of his head.
 

 

Their favorite place was a small hillock at the edge of the campus. They liked to sit on the grass with their lunch and play a game of watching people.
“Look, look over there. The girl in the blue shirt. I can tell she’s annoyed with the boy.”
“No, she’s just leaving for class.”
They would both watch and the boy would chase after the girl and try to stop her, following which Jisoo would smile triumphantly. “Told cha.” 
“She looks way out of his league,” Bobby would observe.
“You’re so shallow,” Jisoo would say.
“People say that about us, by the way,” Bobby would tell her.
“That we’re shallow?”
“No. That you’re out of my league.”
“Actually I spread that word on the street,” Jisoo would tease, putting on a guilty face.
y would laugh and poke her soft cheek affectionately.
One day, she pointed to a guy and mentioned how he reminded her of an ex-boyfriend.
Bobby watched the boy who looked taller than him, and wondered about her exes.
“What was his name?” he asked, trying to sound nonchalant.
“Who? My ex? Min Ho. His name was Lee Min Ho.”
Bobby scratched at a dirt spot on his jeans and thought of going on SNS to search for the name.
“That doofus took my first kiss.” Jisoo shook her head, as though disappointed at herself.
Still trying to remain nonchalance, Bobby asked, “Do you regret it?”
“Giving him my first kiss? Oh well, wasn’t it bound to happen anyway. Don’t we all give it away to some idiot.
“Not really.”
Jisoo smirked. “So your first girlfriend who took your first kiss forcefully while she was tipsy was pretty romantic, huh.”
Bobby laughed and poked her cheek as he usually did.
He kept the thought of how he wished he had been her first kiss to himself.
 

One day, when he was working with Han Bin on an assignment, Han Bin got a hold of his lyrics notebook and flipped through them.
“You know, you shouldn’t lose yourself,” said Han Bin seriously.
“What?” Bobby looked up from his guitar and on seeing the notebook in the other’s hand, made a snatch for it. “Hey, no touching!”
Han Bin walked over to his own music books and looked at his friend, wondering how he should put it. “Dude, it’s great that you love your girl and stuffs, but we’re still young.”
“What has being young got to do with anything,” Bobby scoffed.
“Just…” Han Bin trailed off. “I just mean we’re still unstable. I don’t think we can be sure as to what we really want.”
“Alright, wise one,” said Bobby, amused by his friend’s sudden concern.
“Just don’t lose yourself in the relationship, you know.” Han Bin added.
“I won’t,” Bobby assured him.
Han Bin didn’t think his friend had understood him completely but said no further.   

 

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